Chapter 383 Blank Memory

"There is nature without bad things, but there is no nature without good things. If an unjust person suffers because of the loss of good things, it means that he still knows what is good, and he still has some good parts left."—— "The Book of Lorgar"

They were moving, lifting their legs and then lowering them; their hands followed the movements of their legs, rocking forward, then back, stretching to an angle, and then in reverse.

They walked past the soldier who was lying on his back on the bed in the medical room with his hands hanging on the side of the bed. One after another, they stood tall, like some kind of dark green tree with roots that can leave the soil. They stood numbly and silently around him. walk. The somewhat dusty floor of the ward spread out under their feet, bearing the marks of many uncleaned leather boots.

The soldier recovers from the effects of the anesthetic. He murmured a few curses in the customary dialect of the place where he was born, and tried to sit up, but failed. His arms shook feebly.

The soldier paused, "Does anyone...have a moment to take a look at my legs?" His uneasy voice spread to the surroundings, and part of it reached near his hands hanging on the edge of the bed. "They're not in place, and, for the Emperor's sake, my damn back is probably broken."

The people walking around heard this lone voice, and they turned around at different speeds until everyone was facing the direction of the soldier. Then, those legs began to approach at a steady speed, and the drooping, blood-stained, soaked and stiffened hem of the dark military uniform, like a piece of moving rock, gradually approached the position of the soldier's arm hanging by the bedside. .

"No, goodbye, brothers, it's better not to use it..." the soldier said hesitantly, trying to retreat. He tried his best to lean on the small part of his body that he could move, and rubbed towards the head of the hospital bed. The uncontrollable arm hit the edge of the bed, making a slight thud.

Others continue to approach as if this is a continuation of instinct rather than being manipulated by embodied consciousness. A bandaged leg came too close and touched the hanging arm. The blood from some broken wounds seeped out from the wet bandage and stayed sticky on the soldier's arm.

"No, what the hell is going on with you? Li De? Sur? Soraka? Don't...why are you staring at me? Whoever it is, say something!"

No one responded. Figures surrounded the soldiers one by one, attracted by the sounds made by the soldiers, just like moths constantly entwining the bright candles, standing silently in the silence.

At first, the soldiers resisted in fear and used words to drive them away in vain. Then, after a while, his words transitioned into mechanical repetition.

"Leave," he repeated the last few words of the previous sentence. Sometimes he said more, "You leave," and sometimes there was only the last combination of vowels and consonants, and some "ho ho" words. A gasping sound, similar to a damaged tape.

"...go," he said, "...leave. Leave me. You...leave."

His arm stopped moving and hung stiffly in its original position until the soldier stopped talking and his breathing became slow and steady, as if returning to sleep, undisturbed by fear and pain, moving in a fixed manner like a biological machine. Rhythmic operation.

The people around him left one after another, turning around at the same speed as when they came. The sound of footsteps and clothing filled the entire dark space again, and dust rose and fell quietly until all those who could walk had left the ward.

The light is dim and the brightness of the room is further reduced. Outside the hospital wing, some lights were turned on, and the cold light stretched against the ground, shining on the edges of the arms. Above the hospital bed, the light bulb flickered when the circuit was briefly connected, and soon went out completely.

In the darkness, a dull collision suddenly sounded.

The soldier raised his upper body and tried to leave the bed according to his established habit. His physical condition prevented this intention, so after the soldier reached a certain height, he fell back to the hard board of the hospital bed. His arm shook under the force, twitching nervously.

Soon, the second collision came. After falling down, the soldier immediately repeated the action of getting up ineffectively, and fell down again after a few seconds. Because of the previous movement, his hard head hit the angle between the bed board and the head of the bed. The hospital bed shook violently.

The third time, the fourth time... His actions were repeated again and again, and this was the only source of sound in the dark room.

The flowing droplets slid down the head of the bed and soaked silently into the sheets. Time passed in the dark night.

boom.

The sound stopped.

——

“There’s nothing worth seeing in the back, and certainly nothing in the front.”

The craftsman said, his voice seemed distant at first, and then became closer in an instant.

The darkness was pierced, torn from it like a frame, and the dim infirmary reappeared in front of the two Primarchs.

The glass bottle detached itself from its floating state and returned to Morse's hands. The sample sealed in the glass bottle seemed to have lost a certain unrealistic color. Surrounded by golden runes, it showed an inorganic dimness.

Perturabo immediately lowered his head and observed the body lying on the hospital bed. The former soldiers had blended into the pale sheets and yellowed pillows, revealing sunken and blackened bones under the rotting slurry. Apparently he had been dead for a long time.

"To describe things more pleasantly, this is the memory of the object." Morse said, "There is no emotion, and it will not be affected by the soul and will. The principle is probably to use the object as a lens held by the camera to capture images that occur over a period of time.”

"Of course, the drawback is that we can't read anyone's mental activities, we can only see the impact of Randan on their external performance." He continued to say his words. As for the specific impact, he didn't think it was necessary to explain it in front of two Primarchs with superhuman minds.

On the other hand, after accompanying Malcador to handle a series of paperwork, Morse quickly developed a deep fatigue of the language communication and the handover of affairs in the work process, so that if there was even a clean bed here, he would want to sit down immediately - or lie down.

Perturabo pondered for a moment, thinking about the various characteristics of these transformed creatures and the deviation from their actual combat capabilities.

It is obvious that people affected by the aliens have lost their ability to think to a certain extent before they died, so their consciousness is blank after death.

If the creatures affected by Randan can only rely on their instincts before they died, how can they have enough combat power on the battlefield to match the Imperial Expedition and Defense Fleet?

In addition, if the invasion of Randan is related to the nervous system and consciousness, what factors caused this effect? If it was psychic energy, he believed that with Morse's tens of thousands of years of experience in using psychic energy, he should have solved the mystery of mind control long ago.

"You said that their consciousness still exists." Perturabo said in a deep voice. Unconsciously, a solemn atmosphere was brought into this dusty room by the Lord of Iron. "So, can we take a look at the blank memories left in the consciousness?"

He turned his head, and the data cable fixed on the armor at the other end stretched or shortened with his movements. "What do you think, Aurelion?"

"The Emperor blesses him, because he did not damage the identity of mankind by betrayal and bring rebellious harm to us." Lorgar murmured, nodded to the corpse on the bed, and then smiled, and the light and darkness covered on the golden text changed quietly.

"I agree with your decision, my brother." He said softly and gently. The bearer of the truth always has endless patience and kindness when facing his brothers and sisters.

Morse nodded indifferently: "If you want to see it."

He snapped his fingers ceremoniously, and the whole world seemed to change in an instant, but everything was fleeting. Before any information was captured, the blank memory ended.

"It's over," Morse said, "Guess how long I stuffed you with memory, two people."

"I sense one hundredth of a second, Morse," Lorgar said.

Perturabo blinked, and a large number of redundant and invalid fragments suddenly added to his external auxiliary data system, occupying a large amount of his external memory. He kept the data for the time being and checked the logs in the data system, and got a surprising answer: "One Imperial Year?"

Morse shrugged, "This is what you want to see, Perturabo."

Perturabo was silent. It seems that Randan's manipulation has destroyed personal consciousness extremely thoroughly, which cannot be repaired or reversed-or at least they can do this.

So, will the Astartes suffer the same damage? What about the Primarch?

"There is no human spirit in the body of the demon anymore," Lorgar sadly made a cross with his index and middle fingers on his chest.

"I need to contact the communication base station," said the Iron Lord, "send these data to Horus... Horus?"

"What happened, my brother?" Lorgar asked immediately.

The Iron Lord sighed unhappily: "This is wartime, and they are still involved in disputes!"

"The Son of the First Return and the Emperor's First Son?" Lorgar's violet eyes showed clear confusion. "Why? Aren't they holding a combat meeting?"

"It's Russ's fault." Morse said, the golden light in his eyes extinguished, "Not because of what he did, but mainly because of his existence."

"Horus mentioned Leman Russ. Of course, he was smart enough to use the nickname 'friend who discovered the second Primarch'. None of us knew the Second Legion, and Horus felt it necessary to ask Russ, the only one familiar with the missing Primarch, what his opinions and views were, while keeping the secret of the disappearance of the Legion."

"Lion, with some unique acumen, directly guessed that the unspeakable person was Russ, and had a series of discussions with Horus on whether Russ had the ability to bring a Primarch back to the Great Crusade, and the topic gradually deepened."

"Did they argue about this?" Lorgar asked.

"No. Jonson controlled his temper." Perturabo said, and it was unclear what the meaning of his slight relief at this time was. "He walked away, returned to the Indomitable Truth alone, and told Horus to wait until he had finished talking to Russ alone before they continued the meeting."

He read more information, looked through the dusty window of the medical room to the direction where the Vengeful Spirit was docked, and continued: "There is still a warrior named Luther left in the Dark Angels in the strategic room of the Vengeful Spirit. Jonson trusts him very much."

"Because I have the honor to teach the Primarch some things." Luther answered the questions that Horus Lupercal had when he was chatting with him. He stood with his back to the porthole of the strategic room, his black hair meticulously trimmed close to his scalp.

He looked slightly older than the average Astartes, but the difference was not that big. This may be related to his age when he became an Astartes - fortunately, he was not too old to be suitable for a full set of transformation surgery at that time.

On leaving the Strategium, the Primarchs each left a trusted person with Horus to facilitate communication.

At this time, Daniel, the leader of the Mulistan Order of Lorgar Aurelion, was standing aside with a silent smile, listening to the conversations of others. His skin bears scripture tattoos similar to those of his primarch, except that he uses black ink.

As for Perturabo, he placed a mysterious steel cube here, about the size of the Primarch's palm. It is said to integrate a series of functions such as recording, photography, computing, positioning, transformation, psychic confrontation, fire support, etc. Horus politely asked no further questions.

"What kind of teachings? Can you tell me about it?" Horus sat relaxedly on his spacious throne to reduce his natural pressure in front of the Astartes.

"Some techniques for using words."

"Writing documents?" Horus said, "This is really troublesome. None of my warriors like this job very much. Alas, so do I."

Luther looked like he was just recalling some hard times in the past.

"Not exactly, my lord, but... something like this. The Wolf King's warriors found me, and that's how I got the job."

"So you know some of the sources of the conflicts between them, right?" Horus's eyes lit up, and he shook his head slightly, "No, I won't ask. Leon definitely doesn't want me to know..."

He saw a line of text projected on the iron box left by Perturabo, and the words changed: "Perturabo said that he and Lorgar are coming back, so please call Leon too."

Luther nodded and left.

The Wolf God stood up, sighed with a headache, and examined the map in front of them. A bright red thread zigzagged deep into the star map, marking the movement track left by the Second Legion before it disappeared.

Around this line, several military-related signs were lined up in alternating sparse and dense patterns, indicating the military goals they needed to complete at these locations.

Just by looking at the current layout, Horus could already predict the long battle that would follow. It can last for years, and a critical mission presents an even greater challenge.

"You mean Duncan? He is a rational guy who pays great attention to the allocation of resources. Even the entire legion is as careful as he is and pursues excellence. No, unlike Ferus, Duncan does not have the drive to encourage competition. He also I'm very happy to make everyone live a better life - I haven't heard from him in the past two years, why do you suddenly think of him? "

The star language sent Russ's words, and the Wolf God sent his thanks.

"Daniel, come and see if you can accomplish these goals if you assign them to the Word Bearers." Horus said.

"Me?" Astarte was slightly surprised and walked over quickly.

"Yes, we are all people who perform our duties in the cause of mankind. Anyway, you have been serving as a tactical advisor to Lorgar, right?"

The Word Bearer smiled at Horus's praise, "Yes, my lord."

He observed the aeronautical chart: "I have no doubts about your arrangements, and it is difficult to make decisive suggestions. But just for the sake of my original body's hobbies, maybe he will be willing to take on more destructive tasks. He is very interested in the aliens." The behavior was extremely angry.”

"He doesn't show it - well, he never looks angry," Horus said, changing some of the tactical markings.

"These areas are left for you to vent your anger. Please advise Luojia to control the time. After completing the initial goals, we need to meet here."

He put his five fingers together, and the hand with a gold ring on it was like the horn of a ship's bow, pointing to a narrow corridor in the center of the star map. The projected light weaved a network on his fingertips. The threads marking the territory occupied by Ran Dan were dense but fragile, as if they would collapse at the first touch and could not withstand the attack of the fleet.